Adam Lanza's mom was alarmed by his gruesome images

Apr. 8, 2013
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Nancy Lanza / Lanza family photo, ABC News, via Getty Images

by Doug Stanglin, USA TODAY

by Doug Stanglin, USA TODAY

Nancy Lanza, the mother of Newtown shooter Adam Lanza, had grown increasingly concerned about her son's state of mind but did not confront him after finding ghastly images in his room two weeks before the Dec. 14 school massacre, New York's Daily News reports.

News reporters Matthew Lysiak and Bill Hutchinson report on e-mails they obtained that were sent by Nancy Lanza to a friend in which she expressed her feelings on children, weapons and her 20-year-old son's mental state.

Nancy Lanza, who was fatally shot at the home she shared with Adam, was the first victim of the rampage that left 20 children and six adults dead at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn. Adam then took his own life.

A friend, Marvin LaFontaine, told the News that Nancy Lanza had said that Adam had a genetic disorder that had killed her grandfather and which she also had until it went into remission.

Adam had a form of autism and a sensory perception disorder that kept him from recognizing pain and caused him to recoil from being physically touched.

The newspaper says Nancy Lanza learned of her own condition in 1999, but did not tell her children.

She also had found her son falling deeper into a bizarre mindset, the newspaper reports, and in November, only two weeks before the shootings, found sketches of dead bodies in his room.

"One (drawing) had a woman clutching a religious item, like rosary beads, and holding a child, and she was getting all shot up in the back with blood flying everywhere," an unidentified friend told the Daily News.

LaFontaine, a close friend, also told the newspaper that Nancy Lanza had been upset by Adam's treatment while a student at Sandy Hook.

"Nancy told me he was being picked on at school. That they were just torturing him," LaFontaine told the newspaper. "Adam was an easy target. He was quiet and he would never fight back. I think Adam felt betrayed by the school and this was his act of revenge."

Some parents of the victims of Sandy Hook who appeared on 60 Minutes on Sunday said they believe that something was badly amiss in the Lanza household.

""It was like a set of dominoes, in many ways, just waiting for the first one to tick over," said David Wheeler, whose 6-year-old son Ben was among the victims. "I think it is pretty obvious to anyone who looks that something was very, very wrong in there."

Wheeler also blamed a "community vacuum" that allowed Adam's condition to go unaddressed. "This didn't happen by itself," he said. "This didn't happen in a bubble. She had a life, she had friends. People knew. They had to know."

Jimmy Greene, whose 7-year-old daughter Ana Marquez-Green was also a victim, says he believes "there was a huge, gaping hole in the way that that child was parented."